Rare Photos

On the unique BADAGA community of the Nilgiris in Southern India…their origin, language, culture and customs !!

Website of Wing commander Bellie Jayaprakash that is regularly updated and more info added

The following photos are from Thurston’s Book “Castes and Tribes of South India” published in 1909 by Government of India Press, Madras

Badaga Temple – This must be one of the oldest Badaga temples as the photo was published in 1909. The deity of this temple? Also, notice the elephant, horse and the snake on the outer wall. Any guess as to where this temple is located??

Madivale

Badaga girls in 1909 or earlier. At first glance it appears as though these girls were wearing ‘pattu – head gear’.Take a closer look, their heads have been partially shaved. Did this signify any particular custom or period in the lives of these very young girls. No info available in Thurston’s book

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Two little Badaga Girls on the cover

The picture of a Badaga Man [see the Badagaru Seele he has wrapped around that has distinctive borders and has not changed in centuries].

This is the view of Edha Mane or Inner room. All the edha manes were of the same design in typical Badaga Homes in olden days

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Rao Bahadur Bellie Gowder with British Engineers and workers at Bridge No.33 between Coonoor & Mettupalayam. Bellie Gowder was involved in laying the Nilgiri Mountain Raiway, now WORLD HERITAGE, a hundred years ago. He was conferred with the title RAO BAHADUR for carrying out the excellent but challenging contract work of building this unique railway system in inhospitable forest area that also involved in cutting tunnels through rocky hills as well as building many bridges with sheer guts. He employed human power to lift the racks & rails and remove the rocks and boulders. Many of his workers were BADAGAS who addressed Bellie Gowder as BELLIE MAISTRY

Rao Bahadur Bellie Gowder became very famous after help laying the Nilgiri Mountain Railway between Ooty & Mettupalayam and British Officilas who visited Nilgiris accepted his invitation to come to his house in Hubbathal Village. This photo taken on 27-12-1934 shows the water tank & “Mel Tharas” (upper street houses) of Hubbathalai

Rao Bahadur HJ Bellie Gowder with boy scouts of Hubbathai School which he built (1929) (Rao Bahadur Bellie Gowder with his grand sons (1929)

Rao Bahadur Bellie Gowder’s wife Mrs. Nanji Hethe with the wife of British Governor of Madras in 1930s.( This photo was taken at Hubbathalai Hatti when the Governor along with his wife had paid a visit on Rao Bahadur Bellie Gowder’s invitation to open the first school built by Bellie Gowder. The British guest was presented with the lock – made of pure gold – that he unlocked to open the school building)

Nanji Hethe with one of the sisters of Rao Bahadur Bellie Gowder

Nanji Hethe with her first grand daughter Radha [daughter of Mrs.Kade Idyammal (Photo taken about 65 years back)

Mr.B.K. Bellie Gowder was one of the few educated Badagas who studied upto VIII in St.Antony’s School, Coonoor and completed his SSLC (School Final) from St.Michael’s High School, Coimbatore in early 1900s. There was no ‘regular’ high schools in Nilgiris in those days.

My father -Mr.BK Bellie Gowder in 1969 (just before his death).

Water Colour painting by his son, Bellie Jayaprakash (that is me)

My mother – Mrs. (Kade) Idyammal, now 98 years old

(Photo taken on her birthday on 02-09-2006 -probably one of the oldest Badaga ladies).

Very nice to see all your work of art. Its not easy to hold all these information and to put all of us to understand our community. You should do more on concentrating with our old culture as well as our younger Badaga generation also to take part in all such great works to place our proud community to a high place.

Thank you Madhan. If our website helps in our youngsters to learn the great Badaga traditions and keep the culture in tact, that would be a great achievement. Thanks once again – Wg.Cdr.JP

JP Anna, You have done a wonderful job, but with the generation gap I wonder how many badagas from younger generaton will take advantage. I only wish the parents instil the good old tradition and culture of Badagas to their children (especially those who live away from Hattis).

I am proud to be a Badaga…I just request our people not to convert to other religion….I hate such persons…I think that they make a great sin in their lives if they don’t know about our hethay and ayya.

Hope this will grow more.Still many people and youngsters. do not know about this organisation.There should be a lot more of facts about our people.Soon this should reach most of our people.Love you Badagas

Thanks for creating such amazing album and making this vision availabe to the world.As far as I am concerned, quite a few changes are happening on this Badaga culture. Enjoyed, Felt proud, Thanks a ton.

Very rare collections Sir. Only due to lack of Literature and Inking we have lost a lot of our treasure. Very happy to see some out of those here and very happy that the current generation may not forget the old things when shown like this. I appreciate your effort taken for development of our community. Salutes to you Sir.

Though I am not a Badaga,as a Culture and Law graduate,I would like to point out that to establish the actual origin of a community there must be some sources like,literal,stone inscriptions,hear say stories,even ref.in others area.So,if such things are detected more and more,in my opinion it will create and may even rewrite certain portion of HISTORY in particular the south indian history.Try for the best to reach the peak,though you people already at peak.My best wishes.

Great website!I hope more notes and photos from those days of Badagas,Nilagiris and the NMR can be unearthed.These could be available with the descendents of the English who worked with the badagas during those days.

Namaskara JP Anna,Very worthy photos for our community,I would like to see more photos in this site which can be useful for youngesters to know about our community.
Thank you once again for your great efforts. Best wishes for you & your family.

Great job done, I would expect more from you, and please keep on posting things like this. VERY GOOD WORK. WHY DON’T YOU TRY TO FIND OUT OUR ORIGIN AND THE BEST CULTURE. THIS SITE WILL HELP OUR YOUNGSTERS TO TAKE OUR COMMUNITY IN A PROUD WAY. PLEASE KEEP IT UP – RAVINDRAN RAMAN, KUNDACHAPPAI, [52 yrs old]

[Y]our website is very good and nice. All the rare photos are very nice. Continue your service, we will support you. I am a director and having an ad agency and studio. I am going to release one video album very soon. I have many photographs of my own album and interested in displaying in this website.

Thank you Vasanth, it will be our pleasure to publish your photos / video clips. Pl send them – JP

Being a Baduga guy I am really happy to see all these rare collections. I am really proud to be a Badaga guy. Please continue your wonderful work, let the whole world know about our community. Thank you.

Presently,I am working at Bangalore. Just now I saw our Baduga great culture stills(pix) on this site, Ii am very excited, happy about these pictures..My friends are very much interested to see more baduga culture pics. Many thanks to those who have done this job well. Keep it up.

VERY GOOD WORK. WHY DON’T YOU TRY TO FIND OUT OUR ORIGIN AND THE BEST CULTURE. THIS SITEWILL HELP OUR YOUNGSTERS TO TAKE OUR COMMUNITY IN APROUDWAY. PLEASE KEEP IT UP.
RAVINDRAN RAMAN, KUNDACHAPPAI, 52Yrs. OLD.

What an experience ,incredible work from a member of an awesome Badaga family.

What is life without knowing one’s own history? An eyeopener for the younger generation, to know our ancestors’ lives and learn a lot from them.They have simplified our lives to such an extent but in today’s age and time we crib for material things .These photos got me thinking a zillion things …..keep up the good work sir ..hats off to you

The rare pictures are really extraordinary..superb work guys..and the information about our Baduga community really helps a lot and make me feel proud to be a Baduga…no other caste has such a long and interesting stories I think….keep continuing your good job pls and all the best

Though I hail from a non Badaga community, right from my childhood, I am connected with Badaga Community as I did my Primary School at Manjithala, High School and Higher Secondary @ Govt. Hr. Sec. School, Hubbathalai and my Graduation at Govt, Arts College Ooty. All along my education walks, I had lots of friends from hattis. When I saw the pictures, I really had a feel of walking across baduga hatties with my old hatti guys. Good work. Well organised. Please update the site with more rare and oldest pictures. Keep it up.

BADAGAS = Hospitality :I am proud to be a Baduga … all the above pics depicts the culture and the discipline and the hospitality to one and all ….. still the way led by our ancestors should be continued as of now …. and our culture should be exposed to the world and our community should have no limits to reach the sky .

Very much happy…..I dont need to say anything about the site…,the previous comments would have proved you are a passionate person….simply great….I am proud to be a Baduga….I pray that Badugas should live for ever with the same culture

I am very very glad about such a wonderful site about our Badaga community … the efforts of author of this website really needs to be congratulated… you guys have taken our community to the next level … congrats to everyone associated with this website … may your work continue for long time !

Really amazing website….being a Baduga girl….I didnot know the history of our community….really I felt ashamed when my friends ask about our Baduga community….now I feel proud to tell them that we have a website which has songs ,traditions, amazing photo galary, proverbs etc. Good work…. I just want to know if we people migrated from Karnataka during Tipu sultan’s period?

Thank you Sai. I am very happy that youngsters like you are learning about our community with all its great traditions. Well, as far as our migration from Karnataka during Tipu’s time only because our name Badaga (meaning northerner) is very debatable. I am firmly of the view that our history is much older- may a thousand years or more – and my initial ‘research’ confirms that. More in the future articles…Wg Cdr JP.

I feel proud to be a badaga. All the photos are really amazing and i just want to thank the person who has done this wonderful job.

Thank you Sujith and Mahalakshmi. This website is an ONE MAN effort and the only other person who has tolerated the time and effort I have put in to create and maintain this site at the cost of domestic work is my wife…Wing Commander Bellie Jayaprakash

Amazing ,Awesome I have no words to say, ‘cos I am from Hubbathalai (brought up from the age of 5)and really very much impressed to see all the great photos. Hat’s off to you !! Great Work, I wish to tell all my friends about this site.

I am really astonished by the website. I was just checking the search engine cuil.com and typed badagas and I got this website. I am really proud to see the photos. Even in 1880 our people appear to be doing well , having taken photos with the Britishers I think we were only friends with them, not their slaves. I find it difficult to digest that we were under their rule because in the photos we see the friendship with them.I came across many nice articles about Badaga. I am proud to be a Badaga. I also wish to congratulate you to bring such a good website about our community. All the best. I will tell my friends about this website.

JP adds ; Thank you very much Sudhagar, your kind words are very encouraging !

Its really a wonderful work…….believe me, being faraway from home the website gives me a feeling that world is too small..I have no words to express my feelings when I go through when I’m on the site.It has been a every day routine to just go thru.

Can u send me the PDF format of the book?

JP adds : I am really honoured as well as humbled. Thank you. Are you referring to PDF format of Hethai Amman History?

For a cracker to burst on a big festival, there should be some spark from somewhere. I appreciate from the bottom of my heart for this fabulous work. Hetthai Amma is always around us to bless badaga people, our culture and community will never die….singaratha seeri !

Hi, I saw the above site and it is really interesting. I am a badaga living in chennai,i saw some rare pictures.Hats off to all those involved in this. I am from Achanakal village.proud to be a badaga.CHEERS………

It is an open library for Badaga comunnity and I learnt a lot from this. It is so exciting to know about our community. I know a lot of effort put by you guys, it is simply great and phenominal research by you, and the collections of photos are amazing.Hats off to you……

JP adds: Thank you, this site is the effort of only one guy and not many guys

A real visual treat. Great to see these pictures. They are truly priceless. My early childhood and education was in the Nilgiris. I have travelled by the train many times. Great to see the pictures of the railways.

This is really wonderful and we would like to congratulate on bringing out these rare photographs of our community which would help us to teach the generations to come in a long way. Real good work. Hats off.

Any one of u please find my schoolmate Srinivasan s/o Raman A.E.E of T.N.E.B. I am srithar s/o T.G.Madhavan and Mr.Srinivasan both of us were very close friends during our schooling at Keddai
in the year 1972-1977. The I left to Erode. I want to see my friend Mr.srinvasan. Any one can help me out?

Its really a wonderful work…….belive me, being faraway from home the website gives me a feeling that world is too small..I have no words to express my feeling I go thru when I’m on the site.It has been a every day rotuine to just go thru.

Bellie Jayaprakash adds:
Thank you very much, Badugu Thamma.
How wonderful it would be if every Badaga keeps/retains a typical Badaga name, say like Bhoja/Bella or Kaade/Kaangi, so as to maintain ‘nanga kalachara’ !!

Great Effort
I am very excited to see these pics.There is no words to write my feelings. Great Work.
Ninga Makkai Hattiga Obba Idhalai Pothu, Nanga Baduga Samthayava Munthuga Ethi Bappathuga!!
Great Job.
Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees Keeeeeeeeeep It UP.

Wonderful collection of articles about our culture. I was wondering if there was any effort being made to conserve our culture and traditions. I see a lot of disturbing customs like dowry and such starting to develop that are not ours and are starting to kill our system. Yours is a great effort and keep up the great work. Would love to see more in future. I have some videos of hettai abba that I’ll post a link to very soon.

JP adds: Hello Meenatchi, As I have always claimed elsewhere, we Badagas are slowly losing our identity as simple, straight forward and strong believers of our great traditions.

Anyway, it is the encouraging words from people like you that make me more determined to do something for our community that was initiated by my grand father Rao Bahadur Bellie Gowda and uncle Rao Bahadur Ari Gowda.

Impressive …!I ‘m excited to see these pics. Thanks for organising the contents and providing the links for all related sites. Nice work…! May God bless you with good health and long life to keep up the good work.

JP adds : Thank you ever so much for your truly encouraging words. May God also bless people like you who have big hearts to pray for others. Thanks once again.

Karu Harachodhu

Karu Harachodhu

In his book, THE GOLDEN BOUGH – A STUDY IN MAGIC AND RELIGION (1922) Sir James George Fraser (1854 – 1941) mentioned the following :-
Among the Badagas of the Neilgherry Hills in Southern India, when a death has taken place, the sins of the deceased are laid upon a buffalo calf.For this purpose the people gather round the corpse and carry it outside of the village. There an elder of the tribe, standing at the head of the corpse, recites or chants [known as - "KARU HARUCHODU"] a long list of sins such as any Badaga may commit, and the people repeat the last word of each line after him.

Badaga Dance

Badaga dance is all about grace and style. It is a wonderful sight when a group of ladies dance together. During the funeral, the ladies of the parental village [hatti] of the deceased woman, dance going around the cot [kattalu] to the music provided by the 'host' hatti musicians.
Badaga Dance

Wg Cdr Bellie Jayaprakash, the 'All-in-One' of this site. Started as a hobby but now an obsession.

Even when I was down with poverty and sat at the front court yard,
Even when the near and dear ones despised and deserted,
My mother who gave birth, cared for and brought me up,
Did not blame me and did not reject me- her son, as bad

Even when I toiled as a Cooli with a bent back,
Even when I sat down with my looks dulled and dirty,
Even when I wore patched up old clothes,
My mother never said that I was down ; never rejected me as poor!

Even when I entered the stables and cleaned the dung,
Even when I sat on the rock and tendered the cows,
Even when I lifted loads to earn so as to suppress the hunger,
My mother never found any fault ; never scolded me as ignorant.

Athikkodhu & Karu Harachodhu

The beauty about Badaga community is not only the unique customs specific to the community but the steadfast belief with which atleast some of them are followed by Badagas. One of them is the loud chanting of ‘Athikkodhu – EAY AH HOW – on certain but specific occasions. It is said that in earlier days [hundreds of years back], when the Badaga villages [hattis] were separated by thick jungle forests , 'athikkindu Hoppadhu ' - traversing the forest with loud athikkodhu chant - kept the wild animals away.

Three occasions, when this loud chanting takes place, come to mind immediately,
1)During “Hethay Habba’ – both when from every village the devotees go to Hethay temples at Beragani and Peddhuva [as well as when the Hethay deity from Hethai Gudi is taken to ‘Madi Halla -river’ for change into new dress once a year].Also, and whenever a hatti temple deity is taken on procession during habbas in hattis],
2) During weddings when the bride and groom are brought to the ‘Madhuvay Mane – wedding house' and the newly weds are taken to the temple and
3) On funerals when the widow is brought for ‘olay Kattodhu’ and the ‘akki eththuva ‘ procession starts from the ‘dhodda Mane’ to ‘saavu hanay ‘ where the corpse/body is kept before being taken for burial.

This loud ‘chanting /cry’ is made from the bottom of the stomach by a few leading the procession and repeated by the rest following them.

I have given the ‘live’ recordings of this unique chanting (recorded during a wedding [the band playing in the background] at Thambatty

More than 696,000 hits…

That is a lot of hits for a website [weblog] on BADAGA that is focused on a small community of the Blue Mountains - the Nilgiris, in the southern part of India. Is it due to...

the urge to know the unknown about ourselves....

to sift the truth from fiction....the satisfaction that we have a very unique history.....the mystery about the mistaken migration.....the traditions that are still steadfastly followed.....the great language that has survived for centuries without a script...

The simple fact that this site's motto of 'Proud to be a Badaga ; Proud to be an Indian' has become an accepted norm...

You all, my dear friends, have made me bow my head in gratitude.

Proud to be an Indian and proud to be a Badaga, indeed.

Hope to say - 'thanks a million' soon...

Wg Cdr Bellie Jayaprakash, is the 'All-in-One' of this site. He says that he started this site as a hobby but now it has become an obsession.This website crossed the milestone of 100,000 visitors on 8-3-2010, 150,000 visitors on 20-4-2011, 200,000 visitors on 6-4-2012 , 250,000 on 22-1-2013, 300,000 hits on 6-1-2014, 350,000 on 6-1-15 and 400,000 on 13 -11-2015550000 hits on 1 Jan 2018. Feel humbled but proud

Golden Voice of Kerban Bella Gowder

Kerban Bella Gowder, a great Badaga Singer

Badaga Songs

Listen to these Badaga melodies as you browse

Dance Numbers Sad Songs

Letter

Thomas Chandy (thomaschandy@gmail.com) writes:-
"This is my first visit to this site and was surprised to know how ignorant I have been about the Badaga community. All that I have read makes me hang my head in shame for I have been growing up in the Nilgiris, among the Badagas and I was so ignorant about their origin,culture and so on. This write up is very informative and useful and may the Badaga community grow and spread through the whole world and prosper".

"Thank you Thomas. I am humbled at your kind words. May I hope that the Badagas will live up to your hopes, and thank you once again on behalf of the Badaga community – Wg Cdr JP"

Letter

Anand Ramachandran(Muttinadu) writes :

This is the the first time I am visiting this site.... It took 5 hours to go through this site, you have done a fantastic job. Its just like a bible for our next generation. Thanks for your commitment!

Badaga

From the heart

Do you feel very strongly about any issue concerning Badaga Community? Have the urge to pour your heart out ? Feel free to express yourself without any inhibition and send them tobjaypee@gmail.com

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Save the TIGER

Tiger is HULI in Badaga Lanuage

Read any Indian Newspaper

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CLICK HERE
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Bhuvaneshwari R writes :- This website is one of the best I have seen. Didn’t think I would find so much detail about our culture.
The history of origin of Badagas is quite fascinating. Photos are also really great.
Really good to see someone do an effort to spread awareness.Thank you…
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Here are some great Hethey songs!

Song uploaded in Soundcloud by Suresh M

Needs & Greeds

Here's a question that was posed to the Dalai Lama:

"What thing about humanity surprises you the most?"

His answer is : "MAN - Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices his money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he doesn't enjoy the present,

And as a result he doesn't live in the present or the future. And he lives as if he's never going to die and then he dies having never really lived".

Follow this website via Email

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696,000 hits and counting

Dedicated to my mother Mrs.Idyammal Bellie Gowder [1912-2011] who gave everything to me

That is a lot of hits for a website [weblog] on BADAGA that is focused on a small community of the Blue Mountains - the Nilgiris, in the southern part of India. Is it due to...

the urge to know the unknown about ourselves....

to sift the truth from fiction....the satisfaction that we have a very unique history.....the mystery about the mistaken migration.....the traditions that are still steadfastly followed.....the great language that has survived for centuries without a script...

The simple fact that this site's motto of 'Proud to be a Badaga ; Proud to be an Indian' has become an accepted norm...

You all, my dear friends, have made me bow my head in gratitude.

Proud to be an Indian and proud to be a Badaga, indeed.

Hope to say - 'thanks a million' soon...

Wg Cdr Bellie Jayaprakash, is the 'All-in-One' of this site. He says that he started this site as a hobby but now it has become an obsession.This website crossed the milestone of 100,000 visitors on 8-3-2010, 150,000 visitors on 20-4-2011, 200,000 visitors on 6-4-2012 , 250,000 on 22-1-2013, 300,000 hits on 6-1-2014, 350,000 on 6-1-15 and 400,000 on 13 -11-2015550000 hits on 1 Jan 2018.600000 hits on Sep 2018 Feel humbled but proud